Tamil students and activists in Tamil Nadu and the Eezham Tamil diaspora have firmly voiced for the creation of a sovereign Tamil Eelam in their recent protests. The trend set by the student upsurge in TN has inspired the diaspora youth to conceptually challenge the International Community of Establishments. A strong realization of the necessity of a struggle addressing the ICE and to course correct pro-establishment elements is being strongly felt among second-generation activists in the diaspora. This understanding was reflected by Tamil youth and grassroots activists from Tamil Nadu, Canada and UK.
Speaking from a protest in Chennai against participation of Sri Lankan players in the IPL on 30 March, Pirapaharan, a student activist with the Students Federation for Liberation of Tamil Eelam, said that the International Community should recognize the genocide of the Eezham Tamil nation and that a referendum must be conducted to facilitate the creation of Tamil Eelam, adding that protests will continue till these demands are met.
Ms Kavitha, from the same organization, said that the Sri Lankan players should not be allowed to play anywhere in India.
The student protests in Tamil Nadu have also faced attacks from Congress party elements in the recent past.
Peacefully demonstrating students were attacked by Congressmen earlier in Trichy and Virudhunagar.
Youth and grassroots activists from UK and Canada lauded the spirit of the student protests in TN through video messages, emphasising that the Tamil Nadu students and the diaspora youth will brook no compromise on Tamil Eelam.
At a time when even some sections of the diaspora are still backing a LLRC-based US resolution that denies the historical, earned and remedial sovereignties of the Eezham Tamil nation, the Tamil Nadu student uprising is giving a more principled, pragmatic and strategic approach to challenging with the international establishments, opines Krisna Saravanamuttu, Eezham Tamil youth activist from Canada and a democratically elected representative of Eezham Tamils in Canada, in a message sent to the TN students on Monday.
“While powerful states and world establishments continue to aid and abet the genocide of our nation, while others continue to stand idly by it, you have given your all in the defence of the occupied state of Tamil Eelam. You have not forgotten that the Tamil nation has experienced the most entrenched form of discrimination of any group in the island of Sri Lanka. You have not forgotten that dismantling the national existence of our people has been a central policy of every single government since Sri Lankan independence,” Mr Saravanamuttu conveyed to the Tamil Nadu students.
“Through your historic demonstrations, you have rightfully pointed out that the pro-LLRC US resolution fails to take into account the long history of Sri Lankan state policies that have undermined our social, economic and political sovereignty. Through your demonstrations you have pointed out that the resolution assumes that solutions to our nation’s grievances can be found and addressed within the very same parameters of the Sri Lankan genocidal state by tinkering with various laws, policies and programs,” he further said, elaborating from history that external solutions that did not recognize the sovereignty of the Eezham Tamil nation were rejected by Tamils world over.
Activists from the mass demonstration in London on Friday, which saw the participation of over 5000 Tamils from the UK rejecting any LLRC-based solution, also conveyed support for the demands of the Tamil Nadu students and criticizing the complicity of the establishments in the genocide of the Eezham Tamil nation.
Grassroots activists from the UK Mr Muthu talked about how the TN student movement provided the inspiration for protests in the diaspora. Stating that “It is not wrong to fall, it is wrong to remain fallen,” he appreciated the new leadership that was emerging from the Tamil Nadu students’ upsurge, drawing analogies with how a popular student movement in Tamil Eelam developed into the national liberation struggle.
Ex-TNA parliamentarian Mr Jeyanandamoorthy, who is also a democratically elected representative of Eezham Tamils in the UK, criticizing the LLRC-based US resolution as hollow, and appreciating the resoluteness of the Tamil Nadu students in settling for no demand less than a sovereign state of Tamil Eelam, asserted that this student protest and uprising cannot be stopped by anyone and that the diaspora Tamils view these protests as conceptually strong.
Ms. Sanju Ganesan, an activist with the TYO-UK, stating that Tamils had gathered in London to demonstrate against the injustice of the International Community (IC) said that the resolution passed in Geneva in March does not help the Eezham Tamils in anyway. “We have been telling the IC that we need our own state, our right to self-determination” she said, adding that protests will continue till this demand is recognized.
Youth activist Ms. Camalita Calistus emphasising that that Tamils do not need any resolution that does not recognize Tamil Eelam as the only solution, urged the diaspora youth to join in protest with the student protests in Tamil Nadu.
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